Settling for Squalor: A hardship called 'home'

Martha Elena Garcia Ambrocio, 22, sits in front of her mother. The two share their trailer with their husbands and five children. (Staff photo / Thomas Bender)

Last year, residents of a migrant labor camp in Hendry County faced one problem after another. The septic tank backed up, the commodes broke and burners on the stove leaked. Holes in the walls and windows without screens let in vicious summer bugs. The plumbing in one trailer leaked underneath it for days.

Inspectors found the camp an unsatisfactory place to live 11 times in 2014 — which was actually an improvement for Oak Hammock.

Past years have been far worse. Those conditions are not unique for migrant crop workers who venture to the fields each day to pick tomatoes, oranges or strawberries. Florida’s migrant laborers are regularly forced to live in squalor — in dormitories and mobile homes where sewage backs up into kitchens, where leaks turn to mold and broken windows expose tenants to Florida’s extreme weather and unrelenting pests.

More than half of all Florida camps received an “unsatisfactory” grade from the Florida Department of Health during the last five years, and inspectors wrote up 338 facilities two or more times for keeping workers in filthy, dangerous homes, according to a Herald-Tribune analysis of state data.

Florida officials regulate migrant labor camps in 32 counties, showing up at properties from the Georgia border to the Everglades twice a quarter to investigate things like floor space, sewage, lighting and water supply. At least 35,000 people live in these places, which can be overseen by property managers or the same farmers who run the fields where migrants work. Buses collect laborers in the early morning to take them to their jobs, which can be up to two hours away.

Circumstance leaves migrants with few housing options.

The American rental market is unfamiliar to these workers, most of whom moved straight from Latin America to the fields. Many speak no English and cannot read a lease. A lack of capital and credit makes standard rental deposits a reach.

Workers choose to live in migrant camps because they are the easiest and cheapest option, which allows them to send money home.

The state says it is doing everything it can to protect migrants and, to be certain, most Florida camps are regularly found to be clean and inhabitable.

“The program works to reduce the risk of disease and injury among migrant farm workers through ongoing education and by establishing comprehensive and uniform procedures for permitting and inspecting migrant housing to ensure compliance with standards,” wrote the Florida Department of Health in a statement to the Herald-Tribune.

But the system does not catch all the violators.

All migrant camp owners must be permitted. The state regulates 827 camps with the capacity to house about 35,000 migrants — less than 40 percent of the total migrant workforce believed to be in Florida.

That means tens of thousands of migrant farmworkers are living in unpermitted housing where a lack of oversight means the worst conditions likely go unreported. There is no way to know how many camps operate beyond the reach of regulation.

Inspectors look in rural neighborhoods for signs of farmworkers — fruit buckets and work boots outside of homes — and can issue anyone illegally operating a camp a $1,000 fine.

But they rarely do.

Regulators often don’t take strong action against repeat offenders, and some counties are not as active in seeking illegal camps as others. Counties like Collier and Hendry have a large number of violations only because they are the most tightly controlled.

These two counties have inspectors dedicated to regulating migrant labor camps, whereas officials elsewhere are spread thin by large workloads.

To understand the conditions of permitted camps, the newspaper read more than 840 pages of inspection reports, analyzed more than 25,000 records and interviewed about 40 migrants, inspectors, attorneys, health officials and housing experts. Among its findings:

• The system allows camp owners, again and again, to ignore dangerous conditions. Almost 70 percent of camps received unsatisfactory marks on at least two consecutive inspections for the same violation. For instance, inspectors noted a ceiling leak in one LaBelle unit in September 2013 and returned six months later to find mold.

• A few camp owners account for a large portion of the problem. About one in 10 unsatisfactory cases since 2009 were isolated to five camps in LaBelle, all run by the same operator. Three of these camps have racked up a total of 175 negative inspections over the last five years, making them the state’s most cited facilities.

• The inspection process favors camp owners. State workers give operators a heads-up before they visit, reschedule inspections at owners' convenience and rarely impose strict penalties for those out of compliance. Inspectors issued seven citations — the strongest possible punishment — in the last five years. Such toothless enforcement leads to quick, temporary fixes by providing little incentive for compliance.

• Enforcement varies from one county to the next, which means camps in less-regulated counties are slipping through the cracks. Even though the state provides statutory guidance, inspection manuals and mandatory training for inspectors, some counties are less aggressive than others. In Pasco, there have been 13 recorded inspections on two camps in the last five years, while there were more than 3,000 in Hendry County on 90 camps during the same period.

As the country grapples with immigration reform, one forgotten aspect of migrants’ lives is where and how they live. More than 6,900 foreign workers with temporary agricultural visas come to Florida throughout the year to pick oranges, grapefruit, strawberries, watercress and tomatoes. Experts estimate there are 62,000 living here without proper documentation.

Workers with seasonal visas make an average of $9.52 per hour, are bused to groves and fields on a whim and live in places undesirable for even the poorest Americans. Undocumented workers are less fortunate; they can make as little as $5 an hour, live in constant fear of deportation and are unwilling to complain about conditions.

“Anything is better than nothing,” said Greg Schell, managing attorney at the Migrant Farmworker Justice Project, a legal advocacy group. “My clients have no political capital.”

'We never leave here'

About an hour south of Sarasota, County Road 78 spans about 100 miles from the Gulf of Mexico to the northern tip of Lake Okeechobee. Lined with tall pines, palm trees and stubby palmetto bushes, C.R. 78 embodies rural Florida. Trees turn to picket fences and fenced-in farms as the road stretches into the Hendry County countryside. Signs on nurseries and orange groves one road over indicate work, trabajo, in both English and Spanish.

Tucked beneath the shade of sprawling oaks sits the three Oak Hammock camps, which had the most violations since 2009.

Martha Elena Garcia Ambrocio, 22, lives in a mobile home along a fence that is barbed to keep out alligators. She shares the trailer with her parents, her husband and five children. They live one hour from the Gulf Coast, but they have never been to the beach. A bus takes the adults to the tomato fields most days. Other days, a taxi takes them to shop at the Dollar Market or Save-A-Lot in downtown LaBelle. Aside from these trips, they stay inside their trailer.

“We never leave here,” Ambrocio said.

She and her family moved from Oaxaca, Mexico, in 2009. They crossed the desert into Arizona with the help of a coyote, an individual paid to smuggle people across the border. For five days and four nights, they walked at night and slept during the day. They brought nothing but food and water in backpacks.

Their journey never ended; the family has lived in three different migrant camps since coming to the U.S. Where and how they live is up to the labor boss, el jefe.

“When he says we go to Virginia, we go to Virginia,” Ambrocio said.

Cinder blocks serve as the bed frame for a migrant living in a P & L Harvesting mobile home in LaBelle, Florida. (Staff photo / Thomas Bender)

Their kitchen in LaBelle is their living room. It has a small four-person table and a couch. The floor is unfinished wood. A few paces away from the couch, a light bulb hangs over the kitchen sink in a detached socket with exposed wires. Her family pays $120 per week for this unit. Single men living in units with up to seven other people pay $5 per day.

When there is a problem, Ambrocio waits for the county inspector’s visit to report it. Her landlord does not speak Spanish.

“Most of the people like me,” said Kenneth Kinny. “If you talk to people they’ll tell you I’m a good landlord.”

Kinny has worked in the mobile home park business for the last 30 years and manages at least five migrant labor camps, including the Oak Hammock facilities. He bought them as investment properties when the housing market dipped and his mobile home interests were booming. The properties, he said, were horrible.

“When I bought these, I basically wouldn’t have lived in them,” Kinny said. “They were uninhabitable.”

Kinny replaced half the homes, but he said new restrictions made replacing the second half financially undesirable, so he left them as they were.

“I’m going to be honest with you because I try to make the housing I bought better, better, better each year,” Kinny said. “We get a lot of write-ups.”

Eleven of the 20 inspections last year found Oak Hammock-I an unsatisfactory place for migrant workers to live. It took 17 days for Kinny to fix rotting ceilings, a leaking roof and a broken toilet in a unit at Oak Hammock-II. A unit at Oak Hammock-III that had an overflowing septic tank and a damaged wall panel in the bathroom remained in poor condition for nine days.

“When I got them, it was a disaster,” Kinny said.

Each year, he said, inspector Keith Legg "will have me do a little more. Keith does a good job. He’s hard, but he’s fair.”

Legg is one of two migrant labor camp inspectors in Hendry County and has been inspecting facilities for 20 years. He says Oak Hammock has come a long way. They used to do patch jobs to meet the minimum requirements.

“They’re doing much better than before,” Legg said.

No documents, few options

Graciel Flores has lived in Oak Hammock off and on for five years. She moved to the United States from Chilpancingo, a pueblito in the southwest Mexican region of Guerrero.

Oak Hammock is the most economical option for Flores, but not her ideal. There’s no safety for her here, she says. She is undocumented and has no security. Every couple of months, a bus swings by the camp to tell migrants they are moving to South Carolina for the season.

Tenants are given three days’ notice to pack one suitcase of belongings. Flores’ family throws everything else away, planning to spend the little money they have to replace clothes.

“You can’t take very much,” Flores says. “When you don’t have your own house and your own things, it doesn’t matter.”

Although residents hesitated to complain about Oak Hammock, many migrants who lived there before chose not to return.

But Flores’ lack of security makes staying in Oak Hammock the only option. Her fear of deportation and uncertainty about what tomorrow might bring discourage her from complaining about violations.

“They said it’s ugly, but we’re accustomed to it,” Flores said.

Camp inspections

The Florida Department of Health regulates migrant labor camps in 32 counties, showing up at more than 800 properties twice a quarter to investigate things like floor space, sewage, lighting and water supply. Inspectors grade the camps, the worst grade being “unsatisfactory.” This map shows the percentage in each county of inspections that ended in an “unsatisfactory” mark. Hendry County, in red, had the highest percentage. Click on each county to see the number of inspections, the number of permitted camps and the percent of "unsatisfactories" in that county.

'The minimum requirement'

Inspectors recognize the realities that face tenants like Flores and do their best to look out for them.

Environmental health supervisor Erika Barraza works with zoning officials in Collier County to discover unpermitted camps, and her office often turns cases over to the local health department attorney instead of issuing a citation.

In Hendry County, Legg gives migrants his phone number so they can contact him when there’s a problem.

“I would hope that with the rapport that our inspectors do have with (migrants) that these individuals would call us,” said Brian Prowant, environmental health director at the Florida Department of Health in Hendry.

Officials depend on camp operators for access to the units. They avoid issuing citations, notify camp owners before they show up, reschedule visits at the owners’ convenience and allow operators to leave violations unfixed so they don’t fall out of compliance.

“If there’s something that operators can’t bring into compliance, we’ll work with them if it takes four inspections,” said Sharon Saulter, manager of the statewide migrant labor camp program.

Hendry County inspectors give property managers one to three days’ notice before they show up in order to make sure they are available to let the inspector into the units, Prowant said.

They can’t ensure that managers don’t patch or cover up problem areas during this three-day window, he said.

Once a problem has been identified, camp owners can delay a follow-up visit by inspectors for days or weeks simply by saying they’re not available.

“If it happens and they do have to reschedule, we try to be considerate with the owner of the facility,” Prowant said. “It’s up to the inspector’s discretion.”

Not all of the counties work the same way. Staff sizes, workloads and priorities vary.

For instance, in Palm Beach County, migrant labor camp regulation is part of a heavy load for inspectors who also monitor schools, cafeterias, child care centers, air pollution programs and group homes.

“We do whatever the minimum requirement is,” said Timothy O’Connor, spokesman for the health department in Palm Beach County.

Inspectors’ strongest means of enforcement is a $500 citation, but they rarely invoke it.

It doesn’t matter if a violation has been corrected as long as it looks like the camp owner has made an effort, Saulter said. Citation is a health inspector’s last resort.

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“We work hard not to issue citations,” Saulter said.

Joe Cisnero’s camp was one of five in Florida to receive a citation in the last five years. His tenants lived for at least two months with a leaky roof, rotting walls and broken windows.

But he never paid a fine.

The last resort

A faded black cross sits in the middle of Cisnero’s folded brow. The 77-year-old has a detectable Spanish accent. He never intended to operate a migrant labor camp.

Joe Cisnero, 77, owns one of five migrant camps to get a citation in the last five years. He finds it difficult to maintain the property on his own. (Staff photo / Jessica Floum)

Cisnero built a two-bedroom trailer in LaBelle to live in with his wife in 1959. Migrant workers began knocking on Cisnero’s door looking for a place to stay as soon as his family moved out of the home.

Cisnero says he has remodeled the trailer since he first built it, but he finds it difficult to maintain the property on his own. He spends every morning picking up cans, but finding time to fix the plumbing or the cabinets is challenging because he takes his 78-year-old wife to the doctor every few days.

“I know there’s a lot of houses worse than this,” Cisnero said. “I try to keep it up the best I can.”

Cisnero didn’t know he had to have a permit, and he never expected anyone to scrutinize his property. Camps like Cisnero’s go uninspected in other counties, but Hendry is known for aggressive enforcement.

An anonymous phone tip prompted Legg to investigate Cisnero, who could not understand why the inspector was on his property last year.

“He come asking a lot of trouble here,” Cisnero said. “I told him get off my property. I’ll get my shotgun and make you get out.”

Joe Cisnero built this trailer in 1959 to live in with his wife. It now houses farm workers and is one of five migrant labor camps to receive a citation for inadequate living conditions in the last five years. (Staff photo / Jessica Floum)

Cisnero’s threats drove Legg away so quickly that he left his truck. Legg returned with a sheriff’s deputy, who explained that Legg was a state official and that Cisnero had to comply.

Cisnero applied for a permit later that day, but the conditions of his migrant housing got him written up seven times in the next four months.

On Feb. 4, Legg found Cisnero’s unit riddled with broken windows, sagging ceilings, rotted wood floors and a septic system not equipped to handle the occupants.

The violations still weren’t repaired more than two months later. Legg issued Cisnero a $500 citation on April 15 for failing to correct repeat violations and continuing to operate without a permit.

When he failed to improve conditions for the fifth time, Legg wrote him another $500 citation on April 30. He had one more week to repair the property, which he finally did.

Legg waived his fines.

Others repeatedly get written up for the same violations but face no citations or fines.

Health inspectors’ authority goes only as far as a citation. In order to get an injunction to shut a camp down, inspectors need the help of health department lawyers.

Florida health officials would not make any attorneys available for an interview, and a spokesman said it would cost the paper more than $200 to determine the last time an injunction was filed. However, there were no petitions for injunction in the last year. The spokesman said it would cost more than $300 to determine the number of camps the state closed in the last five years.

Local prosecutors can go after camps for operating without a permit, which is a criminal violation. But more often than not, these cases get no traction and stall before anyone is charged, said Schell, the attorney at the Migrant Farmworker Justice Project.

State prosecutors have to prioritize, Schell said, and fixing bad migrant housing is not a priority for voters. He could not recall the last time a camp owner had gotten an injunction.

“Because who cares about poor migrants that are undocumented?” Schell said. “Nobody cares about those people.”

For more information

If you are living in a labor camp and would like to report a problem please contact reporter Jessica Floum at (941) 361-4965 or jessica.floum@heraldtribune.com.

For more information, call Florida's Farmworker Helpline at (800) 633-3572. For work-related complaints, farmworkers can also contact the Fair Foods Standards Council complaint line at (855) 873-9494.

Database: Florida migrant labor camp inspections

Florida’s migrant farmworkers live in housing regulated by the state’s health department. Residential migrant housing includes homes, mobile homes, barracks and dormitories where five or more season workers live. The people who run the fields where migrant work typically oversee the camps, but housing is also managed by trailer park operators and sometimes the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, or HUD. The database below shows all migrant housing inspections from the last five years. One in 10 inspections found camps unsatisfactory. Use the fields below to search for inspection results of camps near you.